Jun 10, 2023

LaTeX 2023-06-01 release distributed

With a few days delay (because of a performance issue we had to resolve first) we have submitted 2023-06-01 release of the LaTeX kernel to CTAN. It should have made its way into TeX Live for everyone by now (or pretty soon).

We did not manage to get everything in that we originally planned for the June release, but given that the newsletter has seven pages is some indication that we have been busy.

Automated tagging of PDF documents

We have now enabled new automatic tagging functionality for additional LaTeX elements, among them most display environments, standard sectioning commands and content, figure and table listings. Also supported are standard floats, citations, bibliographies and a few more elements, but we aren’t yet at the point that we can state that all elements described in Leslie Lamport’s manual on LaTeX are supported — but we are getting close.

This can be activated through

\DocumentMetadata{testphase=phase-III}
\documentclass{...}                     % article, book or report

In addition there is also an early prototype for tagging formulas, which can be activated through

\DocumentMetadata{testphase={phase-III,math}}
\documentclass{...}

It offers support for LaTeX’s standard math environments and also for all environments provided through the amsmath package.

All of this automation is currently in a prototype state and restricted to the use of standard classes (article, report, and book) and it supports only a limited number of add-on package. See the LaTeX2e News Issue 37 newsletter for further details. It provides information how to submit feedback on the new functionality.

The newsletter also covers various other small enhancements or corrections that we provide with the June release.

The LaTeX Companion, third edition is now in print

A while back we announced that the third edition of The LaTeX Companion can be preordered. This status has changed and since middle of May the book is available from the publisher’s website as well as from book shops or online shops such as Amazon. The digital version is still in the works (the ePub version to be precise), but if you order from Pearson they already ship the PDF version with the ePub following automatically, once ready. To give you an idea of what is covered in the third edition, here are some excerpts:

Check out this earlier news post for additional details.

Enjoy — Frank